The rule ‘Get Woke, Go Broke’ holds true, but why?
The recently released film ‘Birds of Prey’, starring Australia’s Margot Robbie, has fallen victim to an increasingly powerful and unheeded rule.
This rule, commonly explained through the term ‘Get Woke, Go Broke’, refers to the way in which films, the music industry, television, adverts, companies and marketing campaigns focus on ‘Social Justice’ issues and/or left-wing talking points to either sell a product or simply portray themselves in a particular manner.
For those unfamiliar with social justice terminology, the term ‘Woke’, which was first coined within the African American community, simply refers to someone who is aware of the perceived racism, sexism and bigotry present in essentially every area of western society. The process of getting to this point is referred to as ‘Getting Woke’.
For example, someone such as the enlightened Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau, would be seen as an individual who is ‘Woke’, especially as he prefers the term people-kind over the grotesquely and violently sexist term man-kind. Though his ‘Wokeness’ did take a massive dip after his multiple blackface incidences were uncovered during the Canadian federal election.
The film ‘Birds of Prey’ is far from the only example one can call upon to highlight the prescient nature of this rule. Gillette, a company that sells razors primarily to a particular target demographic, i.e. men, decided it would be a good idea to run with a woke advertising campaign vilifying them.
The advert, “We Believe: The Best Men Can Be” focused on the idea that ‘toxic-masculinity’ would need to be dealt with. It showed men catcalling women, bullying and asked the question, “Is this the best a man can get? Is it?”.
Following the release of the advert Gillette and parent company, P & G received some support but also a significant amount of backlash. But, the rule proved true once again and P & G took a US $8 billion loss in the value of its 118-year-old shaving company. Although, the company blamed this loss on a strengthened US dollar and smaller market, the backlash was obvious to anyone on social media or other similar platforms.
Another, similar, example is that of Handsome Her Café in Melbourne. The owners came up with a brilliant strategy that involved charging men an extra 18 cents to account for the so-called ‘gender pay gap’, as well as making sure women were the first to be seated. Unsurprisingly, the blatant sexism at the core of the Cafés policies didn’t actually help to increase revenue and the business closed down after just two years of operations.
I could go on and list many more examples of businesses, movies and others that have fallen victim to this rule, as many articles have already done so. But, doing so doesn’t answer the question I’m attempting to answer in this article, why does this rule exist?
‘Woke Capitalism’ is driven by a massive group of progressives who’ve taken over the media, marketing firms, and many senior positions within a litany of companies. These progressives force a change of strategies, principles and standards within a companies core structure.
Unfortunately, for these companies, this is when the rule starts to take effect. Basically, the new strategies and standards set by these progressives don’t prioritize a companies shareholders or its profit. What it does do, is put inclusion, diversity and virtue signaling at the forefront of the company. And this deviation is what causes companies to lose customers and then profit.
Most people, when being lectured to by a business or member of the elite, actually dislike it. And a prudent example of this is easily Ricky Gervais’s speech at the Golden Globes.
What he said reverberated with most members of the general public who are sick of the empty virtue signalling of celebrities and their ilk. So, when a company attempts to tackle ‘toxic-masculinity’ or force men to pay more or even force diversity into a movie cast, more often than not, it doesn’t actually help increase profit or make a better movie. Indeed, getting ‘woke’ doesn’t actually increase profit or make a better movie, it merely alienates a customer base and damages a company’s brand in the long term.
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